Hard to pinpoint biggest turning point

September 18, 2006|By Gordie Jones Of The Morning Call

The Eagles, as it turned out, were as much at a loss after Sunday's game as they had been while the clock was ticking.

No one, it seemed, could explain how the offense went from humming to horrid. Why a Birds team that churned out 380 yards and 20 first downs in the first 34:11 of the game against the Giants could be limited to 71 yards and three first downs in the final 37:38.

The result was that the Eagles coughed up a 24-7 lead.

"We were moving the ball -- running and passing the ball," Donovan McNabb said. "It's just that we weren't putting it together consistently. We'd get a big play, then a penalty. We would get another big run, and then get tackled for a loss."

Andy Reid said he wasn't aggressive enough in his playcalling. Tight end L.J. Smith said they didn't "keep that dog" in themselves long enough.

Is it not possible that complacency was also an issue?

"I feel like we were ready," wide receiver Donte' Stallworth said.

OK, so how 'bout some big strategic wrinkle on the part of the Giants?

"We didn't really make a lot of changes," New York coach Tom Coughlin said.

Only this, he said: "What we tried to do was get some stability -- get some pressure, get some containment [on McNabb]. We had problems when the quarterback came out and made plays scrambling around. We lost containment."

They seemed to get that cleaned up in the second half, and they stymied the Birds' running game. The Eagles rushed 17 times for 53 yards after the break, 30 times for 106 yards in all.

Two running plays proved pivotal -- safety Gibril Wilson's fourth-down stop of Correll Buckhalter with 8:45 left, and Wilson's fumble-producing hit on Brian Westbrook with 4:13 to play and the Eagles still nursing a 24-14 lead.

"The fourth-and-one stop not only gave us the ball back with decent field position," Giants defensive end Michael Strahan said, "but it also energized the defense and made us realize, "Hey, if we get them in third and fourth down and we have an opportunity to stop them, we can do it.' Because we had done it."

The Eagles forced a punt after that fourth-down stop, but Westbrook's fumble, at his own 33, led to Eli Manning's touchdown pass to Amani Toomer with 3:28 to play, cutting the gap to three. Jay Feely's field goal tied it with seven seconds left in regulation, and Manning found Plaxico Burress for the game-winning TD in the extra period.

"As a team, a veteran football team, if you have the ball with three or four minutes left in the game and you hand the ball off to your back, he needs to take care of the ball," Westbrook said, "and I have to do a better job of taking care of the ball. I can't blame anybody else besides myself on that play."

But really, there was plenty of blame to go around, plenty that went awry. There was no simple explanation.